Vol. 39, No. 1, Spring/Summer 2001- "Political Geography"

POLITICAL GEOGRAPHY OF DEVOLUTION IN THE AMERICAS: THE CASE OF BRAZIL'S SOUTH

(pp. 3 - 17)

Eric K. Spears

Mercer University

Macon, Georgia

H.J. de Blij

Michigan State University

Arbor, Michigan

Abstract

This paper explores the centrifugal forces that are present in the modern day federal state of Brazil. The study demonstrates how centrifugal forces are operating in South America's largest country and the effects they have on its economy. Successive Brazilian governments have tried to unify this country's territory and space economy throughout its 500-year history. More recently, global economic fluctuations and internal political dissention have encouraged a group of regional separatists to push for an independent country known as the "Republic of the Pampas" within the Brazilian South. However, it remains uncertain how the federal government in Brazil will respond to this and other issues.

RUSSIA'S KALININGRAD: REPORT ON THE TRANSFORMATION OF A FORMER GERMAN LANDSCAPE

(pp. 18 - 37)

William R. Stanley

Distinguished Professor Emeritus

Department of Geography

University of South Carolina

Columbia, South Carolina

Abstract

Absent its former German population and after 50 years of Russian occupation, the old German cultural landscape in northern East Prussia has been profoundly altered. Known today as Kaliningrad, the historic Hanseatic and Prussian city of Konigsberg was the scene of terrible destruction in early 1945. Only the relatively unscathed suburbs retain their German architectural character today. After the war, enormous state farms replaced the smaller holdings of an earlier period. Starting in 1991, collective farms were transformed into agricultural cooperatives. Comparing pre-World War II maps with recent visual observation reinforces the tragic reality that several hundred German villages and their communications infrastructure have disappeared. Some relics remain, but more than fifty years of Soviet/Russian political control and resettlement have led to a landscape depicting less its previous German flavor and more that of the newcomers. To understand better how this transformation occurred, the paper is introduced by a lengthy geopolitical assessment linking the last months of World War II to the decade following the collapse of the Soviet Union.

THE DIFFUSION OF EVANGELICAL ABOLITIONISM

(pp. 38 - 62)

Richard L. Wolfel

Department of Geography

Indiana University

Indiana, Pennsylvania

Abstract

Religion was a major influence on the political development of the United States during the early nineteenth century. This research examines the influence of revivalistic religions on the diffusion of the American Anti-Slavery Society, a prominent abolitionist organization. Resource mobilization theory and new social movement theory are used as the conceptual frameworks in an effort to link the societal characteristics to the diffusion of a political-social movement. It is concluded that a particular mix of societal characteristics was important to the success of evangelical abolitionism. These characteristics include: revivalistic religions, the existence of a large population of free African-Americans, the existence of institutions of higher learning affiliated with revivalistic regions and the influence abolitionism had on the mode of production within a society.

GALICIA: BETWEEN THE PERIPHERY AND THE EUROPEAN UNION

(pp. 63 - 78)

Urbano Fra Paleo

Department of Geography and Spatial Planning

University of Extremadura

Badajoz, Spain

Abstract

The accession of Spain into the European Union has meant modernization, competition, rationalization and convergence with other European economies. But this process has not been spatially uniform, and this issue becomes critical when candidates from east Europe are negotiating their integration as new members. Peripheral regions are going through a slower process of convergence despite having been subsidized through structural funds, but have not yet developed a real regional economy with increased income. Available funding will be reduced when expansion includes countries with less developed regions. Galicia, an Atlantic region in the Northwest of Spain, has advanced by changing its structures but has not been successful in transforming the development paradigm that calls for abandoning the agriculture-based economy and adopting new targets.